California Tortilla

CalTort is a pretty nice place to go -- especially if you have nut allergies, since the only nuts they have are some "may contain" prepackaged desserts. They have super cool soda machines and hot sauces, and the employees at mine are super nice and spunky, so I like the atmosphere itself. As for the food, it's not bad.


Southwest Salad w/ grilled chicken, honey lime dressing.
This is a great salad. The chicken tastes great, the corn and tortilla strips taste great, and it's not TOO unhealthy. The guacamole I don't like, but that's OK. :D

Blackened Chicken Taco: Not too shabby! The salsa (really pico de gallo) really pulls the whole thing together. The chicken is good, but it's really blackened/seasoned. I like it though, it's a nice little lunch.

Pork Taco: Like Chicken taco, but perhaps better! Moister, at least.

Taco Beef Taco: Awfully boring, but tastes just like tacos made at home, so good for that nostalgia.

Steak Taco: This is worth the 40 cent upcharge if you get it on Taco Tuesday! The steak is marinated in some unique sauce, so it's nice and moist and tastes good. A little chewy but in a fun way.

Fajita Burrito (with chicken): Hmm. This would be really good if it didn't have so much freakin' sour cream and guacamole in it! Maybe I'll try a different burrito next time.

Taco Salad (with grilled chicken or pork): This is very tasty! It's probably not very healthy though, heh heh. Comes with a ton of sour cream and guac, which I just spoon off. Also a buttery taco shell, a lot of cheese, some lettuce, meat, and salsa. It's a good size and good flavor though.

Street Tacos: glad i tried these, mostly so i know not to get them again! these are smaller than regular tacos, but not too small -- a great size for a 3 taco meal. however, they are also on corn tortillas and not flour -- which i definitely dislike! update: the changed some of the flavors and now use 2 corn tortillas, which is somehow an improvement!
Carnitas -- basically like a regular pork taco....so, it was good.
Havana Chicken -- ok - probably my favorite - pretty much a BBQ chicken taco and they stuck an avocado and lime slice in it.
Korean BBQ: very spicy!! almost too spicy to ascertain any flavor -- the steak meat was good as usual, but the saucy tomato/onion bits were too overwhelming and not tasty.
California Sunset - this was OK, but not great. the corn tortillas have grown on me, but the only real flavor is bland chicken cube, unappealing "onion relish", and spicy sauce (just generic spicy sauce). a real middle of the road pick. If you like that relish-y onion crap, this might work for you, though. I do like that there's a random avocado slice in here (I like avocado now, unlike the Katilina of 6 years ago) 5/10
Chicken Club - this was way better than I expected. definitely my favorite street taco experience. the tortillas were soft yet firm, the sauce was just moist without any gross ranch flavor, the bacon wasn't too strong, there was a lot of good lettuce, it really did taste like a good club sandwich. nice work, caltort. 8/10
Screamin': a lot like the california screamin' burrito, but with those tasty corn tortillas! this is spicy, which is kind of nice, and it was loaded with blackened chicken (which I like). the fajita veg and cheese sauce I wasn't wild about, but as a package this is solidly average. i think it is the spiciest one, and the most meat-y one (at least in this case), so if you like that then give it a shot! 5/10

Chicken Tortilla Soup: Warm, cheesy, and comforting. Good on a cold night when you're up working. 

Turkey Chili: They got rid of this (and the soup, sadly) for a while, but now it's back, and I think it's a little different! It also costs like 5 bucks, which is not happening for me, but I got a free cup for being a gold member! Ha! It was really good, the kidney beans were of course numerous and I picked them out, but there were lots of big big tomato chunks which were awesome, and the rest was just saucy turkey bits, which was good and just a tiny bit spicy. Also comes with pico, sour cream, cheese and tortilla strips, so you can make a good time out of it. 7/10


Overall
cost: 5/10
taste: 7/10

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Laura says: I like this place a lot. I mean, I naturally like any place that has tacos and chips & salsa, but this place feels so familiar and the name is endearing. The drink machines are so futuristic and impressive to me still, and full of drinks that I want to drink! The taco combo is a good deal but also is like just a little bit too much food because their tacos are stuffed full of stuff. They were super slow when we went, but that's ok with me because I'm rarely in a hurry and I felt like I had all the time in the world to look at the menu and figure things out. I also liked the queso a lot more than I like most quesos. Is there an upstairs? I'd like to find out. 9/10